Preface The NACE discussion boards recently posted a question about what career assessment you would use instead of the MBTI personality test. Understand that it's a trick question, because MBTI does not measure personality – at least as it's been understood by the field of psychology for the past 80 years ..read more

When it comes to what students want from their college education, the answer is not a simple one. Students come from diverse backgrounds, have different goals, and seek a range of experiences. However, some general trends exist among students regarding what they want from their college education. Here are a few key areas that students typically prioritize ..read more

You've taken the PathwayU assessments, read through your results, explored your career matches, and identified a few career paths that pique your interests. Now what ..read more

An old English proverb is “waste not, want not” but a modern maxim of college administrators is “Use it or lose it.” Leaders in colleges and student services understand that if they don’t spend all of their budget, those above them may assume they don’t need it. So down goes next year’s budget ..read more

Are you trying to discern a sense of purpose for your career? You might be surprised to learn that engaging in expressive writing about your career purpose is a tried-and-true strategy for gaining clarity. Seriously—as Loyola University Chicago researchers Steve Brown and Nancy Ryan Krane discovered years ago[i], if you want to make progress in your career decision-making, spending focused time writing out your thoughts and feelings about your career direction, especially your career goals, makes a big difference. As context, research in psychology has established lots of evidence that suppo ..read more

Coaching is a central service for any college career center–and it’s also one of the most time-consuming. When there are only so many hours in the day for your coaching staff to meet with students, scaling up your services–and making sure you’re able to offer personalized, meaningful coaching to your entire campus–can seem nearly impossible.  ..read more

Part 2: Validity. In my last blog post, I introduced the idea of reliability (e.g., consistency) and noted that if scores on a career assessment are not reliable, there is no way they are valid. But what does validity mean, and how can you tell whether an assessment provides valid scores or not ..read more

Part 1: Reliability.  Are all career assessments created equal? If not, are there ways to judge which ones are better than others? Career assessments vary widely in their quality, and yes, there are ways to differentiate good assessments from bad ones. This has nothing to do with how attractive a score report is, how well an instrument is marketed, or its popularity. Psychological assessment is principally about translating a theorized concept (like interests, or personality) into a measurable unit, and some assessments do this much better than others. Reliability and validity evidence s ..read more

If you are reading this perhaps you too passionately believe that today's career center has evolved to be a critical part in ensuring all learners have a successful post-secondary education.   While there are many ways to define the term successful, I see it in this simple way:  ..read more

Not too long ago, I was reading one of my favorite career advice columns when I noticed a conversation happening in the comment section about the uselessness of college career centers.   Of course, as a former career education professional, I was offended!  But it did make me think:  Why do career centers get such a bad rap, and what can be done about it?  ..read more